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Chris Roberts Project Countdown: New Game or Developer?

According to the Wing Commander CIC site (http://www.wcnews.com/news/2012/09/0...unts-cloudward), Chris Roberts is about to announce a new project. The website http://robertsspaceindustries.com/start/ has a countdown set to end at midnight PST, hopefully revealing this newfangled thing he's supposedly working on. Additionally, Chris Roberts' Linkedin rofile has changed to "Chairman & Chief Creative Officer at Cloud Imperium". There are quite a few connections to support this, as found in the CIC's news bit.

But most tantilizing of all, is the piece of art dug up at the Cloud Imperium site.

If you’ve made it here, you probably know who I am. Maybe you have heard of Wing Commander and its sequels, or perhaps Strike Commander, Privateer or Freelancer.

If not, you’re still welcome!

I grew up making video games. I sold my first game at the age of 13 and created Wing Commander when I was 21. But 10 years ago, at the height of my career I took a break. Not because I stopped loving or playing games but because I had become frustrated with the limits of the technology at the time to realize my vision.

I decided to pursue my desire to create detailed worlds and tell sophisticated stories in film.
I always said the moment I became interested in making games again was when I was going to come back.

With the power of today’s computers and the reach of the internet I finally feel I have the tools to build the connected experience that I always dreamed of. A world that would be more satisfying and richer than any film I could work on.

With films you tell stories but with games you create worlds.

If you’ve played my games, you’ll know that’s what I love to do.

I’m here to tell you that I have been working on something for just under a year, something that embraces everything that my past games stood for but takes it to the next level.

I hope you’ll be as excited by it as I am.

My new endeavor is still in its early stages but I invite you to take the journey with me.
If you register below you’ll become an insider that will not only give you early access to the game’s website and forums, but you will also get the opportunity for rewards and privileges that no one else will get. It’s my way of showing how important your early involvement and support is.

The full announcement will be at 10am Eastern Standard Time (UTC -5) on the 10th day of the 10th month of this year.

My name is Chris Roberts.

And if you would indulge me I would like to create a world for you.

- If the sound of Samuel Barber's "Adagio For Strings" makes you think of Kharak burning instead of the Vietnamese jungle, most of your youth happened during the 90s. -

Indeed, seems the actual announcement will be on Oct 10th, which as many of you may know is during GDC. The website itself is a bit of a social hub and drip-feed farm, but there are a few bits on the site that are affirming suspicions:

1) Forums are General Chat, Wing Commander Chat, and Freelancer Chat. Pretty specific those last two.
2) The little fiction bit written for the site indicates space travel.
3) The artwork has very strong space travel themes.
4) The "Golden Ticket" indicates a 24-month development period.

Everything is pointing to a FPS manshoot where you fight space-terrorists.

Come on spiritual successor to Freelancer with a dynamic economy and universe!
Freelancer got two things right - controls, and universe. Its interface was mouse driven and dead simple to use, it was easy to play, and it had the romantic vision of space with fanciful planets, beautiful nebula and asteroid fields with treasures and secrets waiting to be found, and was damn fun to play.

Just to give you an update, Roberts answered a few gaming related questions, figured I'd post the 4 pertinent ones:

Q: Do you think it’s possible to bring space sims back into the mainstream? If so, how?

A: YES! I feel like the appeal of Space Sims has never really gone away, it’s just that people stopped innovating and pushing the boundaries of what you could do. For me, games are all about immersion into a world. I think that’s what the Wing Commander series was best at and that was what I was aiming for when designing Freelancer. But I feel that other genres – the FPS and 3rd person action adventure – have taken this mantle and ran with it. If you look at a FPS game built in 2002 it’s a pale comparison to the sophistication of one built today. I haven’t seen the same progress in space sims. Freelancer still looks as good as most of the newer space sims. I also think that every genre needs a champion that’s passionate about pushing the genre. In FPS you had Id, Infinity Ward, Bungie and DICE, in 3rd person cover-based shooters, Epic and BioWare. Action Adventure you had Naughty Dog and so on. Since I took a break from the industry, outside of CCP’s work, space sim’s haven’t had a high profile developer to push the boundaries. I hope to change that with my new project!

Q: How do you feel about modern games; which of them have interested or inspired you?

A: I think there’s a lot to be admired about games today – the level of graphical fidelity and sophistication is mind blowing in comparison to when I was last making games. Games that I played, finished and loved in the last few years have been the Uncharted series by Naughty Dog – possibly the most cinematic games ever made (yet!) , Battlefield Bad Company 2 and Battlefield 3 (love the whole team aspect, playing with your friends and the destructible environment), Mass Effect series (great cinematic story telling), StarCraft 2 (E-Sports!), Fallout 3 (great, deep FPS RPG) and finally Demon’s Souls – possibly the most frustrating yet rewarding game I’ve ever played. I’ve never put 200 hours into a game before but I did on Demon’s Souls. There’s some great design in the game, and I also think it harkens back to the old days of gaming where beating a level meant something. With too many of today’s games the difficulty is dumbed down so everyone can finish. Problem with this is that it’s just not as rewarding for the player. In most shooters I just charge in blasting in the single player campaign as I know if I die I will respawn a few seconds earlier. My play style is sloppy. But with Demon Souls I had to think, I had to be careful and the sense of accomplishment form beating the game was much more than I have gotten from a game in a long while.

Q: What was it that frustrated you about game development that prompted you to take this break?

A: It was a combination of the increasing development length – Freelancer had been in production for 4 years when I sold Digital Anvil to Microsoft, frustration with the technology being able to realize the full vision I had in my head and the sense that Microsoft (and the rest of the industry) was becoming more interested in console than PC. Once you mixed in the politics that come with any large organization), it had gotten to the point I had lost my sense of fun when making games …

Q: The Wing Commander games didn’t allow much content creation, but Freelancer continues to flourish because of mods. What is your position on user-created content?

A: Absolutely for it! I love what the Freelancer community has done, and I’m impressed what other communities like the Skyrim or Team Fortress achieve with good tools. There’s a lot of talent and creativity out there and I fully intend to enable it and support it in my new game.

Come on spiritual successor to Freelancer with a dynamic economy and universe!
Freelancer got two things right - controls, and universe. Its interface was mouse driven and dead simple to use, it was easy to play, and it had the romantic vision of space with fanciful planets, beautiful nebula and asteroid fields with treasures and secrets waiting to be found, and was damn fun to play.

On the other hand, it was entirely static.

Bam. That's what I want--a more dynamic Freelancer. I was putting most of my hopes into Kinetic Void, but now I can transfer some of them thisaway (maybe... please?).

Interesting question, to ask Roberts how he feels about modern games. When I first played Freelancer--earlier this year--I was struck by how utterly modern it felt. It's not often that you load up a ten-year-old game from a typically complex genre that has dead simple controls by modern standards, or even any standards. I think it's pretty accurate to say that the genre hasn't really progressed much since. I wouldn't be opposed to a space sim that borrows multiplayer ideas from some of the major Freelancer mods.